SA wants to be continent’s automotive producer of choice – Patel

13th December 2019 By: Creamer Media Reporter

Trade and Industry Minister Ebrahim Patel is hoping that regular meetings between government, labour and representatives from the vehicle assemblers and automotive component suppliers, will create a stable and predictable environment for automotive investment.

The Automotive Executive Oversight Committee (EOC) on Friday held its inaugural meeting and will continue to meet every three months, as government aims to ramp up vehicle exports.

“The meeting was an important moment for leaders across the industry to come together with government and look at how we can boost production exports of motor cars made in South Africa. We are already the continent’s biggest producer and we now want to be the producer of choice for the continent,” said Patel.

At 374 215 vehicles exported in the first 11 months of 2019, the industry is already at a new yearly record with 351 139 being achieved in 2018.

The meeting agreed to set up six working groups, each of which will focus on a different pillar of the Automotive Masterplan, namely; local market optimisation, regional market development, localisation, infrastructure development, industry transformation and technology and associated skills development.

The relevant government departments and agencies would be co-opted or invited to the various working groups according to their areas of responsibilities.